Jersey City officials gathered before dawn today at the city's Summit Avenue emergency management headquarters to respond to traffic problems related to the Pulaski Skyway shutdown.

Today is the first weekday of the shutdown, and city officials are expecting motorists who normally use the Skyway to clog city streets as they find alternate routes to Jersey City and to the Holland Tunnel.

"I thought we'd see more traffic by now," said Greg Kierce, director of the city Office of Emergency Management, as he scanned 12 televisions screens showing footage from security cameras placed at various points throughout the city.

One of the cameras shows the intersection of West Side and Communipaw avenues, which city officials are monitoring closely for signs of unusual congestion.

If that juncture, and Grand Street, start to see a lot of extra traffic, Public Safety Director James Shea said, "that's when we'll really have problems."

Mayor Steve Fulop said he believes today is really a "dress rehearsal," since Jersey City schools are not in session this week. The effects of the shutdown won't be 100 percent evident until next Tuesday, when classes resume, Fulop said.

"That gives us an opportunity to adjust," he said. "Gradual is better."

Kierce said he hopes motorists who usually take the New York-bound lanes of the Pulaski Skyway took the state Department of Transportation's advice and took mass transit instead of driving.

The New York-bound lanes of the Skyway closed on Saturday for two years as the DOT manages a $1 billion rehabilitation of the 82-year-old bridge.

Later today, Fulop will head to the DOT's command center, located at Lincoln Park on the West Side of Jersey City, and may take a helicopter ride with state officials to get a bird's-eye view of traffic problems.